3 Fun Piano Games To Play With Your Students
by Jodie Carter, Co-Owner and Creator of PianoBox Games with Kathie Warnock, PianoBox.net
Did you know that when you gamify abstract musical theory concepts, players receive instant feedback, have a longer attention span, and are more motivated to learn?
When you gamify learning, it not only becomes more enjoyable, but students are receiving instant feedback on missed concepts. The power of instant feedback is actually why I fell in love with the piano teaching app, Piano Marvel, and use it with my students. This piano instruction software instantly informs students of a missed note as they are practicing a song.
These 3 Fun Piano Games To Play With Your Students from PianoBox will help you to gamify musical theory. Play with any level, any number of people, and in any time frame that you have.
1. Glissando: Grand Staff Note Identification Board Game
Players go from the top of a grand staff and roll a die going from note to note or sliding up or down a Glissando. The objective is to get to the bottom of the game board first! Players land on different colors of notes on the grand staff which require them to do different things such as identify notes (black), draw the notes (orange), take another turn (purple), or glide up and down the glissandos (green). To make it even more fun, yell together: “Glissando!”
2. 88 Keys: Keyboard Skills Board Game
88 Keys is a game board that like the name says, has all 88 keys. Players start on the lowest note of the keyboard and on their turn they take a card, which will tell them what to do to move up the keyboard towards the finish line, which is at the top. It is a race to the highest note! The cards ask them to show their understanding of multiple important keyboard skills including note names, sharps, flats, intervals, skips, half steps, whole steps, repeat signs, rests, and ties. For beginners, if they don’t know how to do what is asked, simply teach them. For intermediate students, see how quickly they can go from the start to the finish correctly (or challenge them to play the scale starting on each note they land on!)
3. VIVACE: Identifying and Defining Musical Notes & Symbols
Vivace comes with 17 large acrylic musical symbols, three levels of playing cards (the picture of the symbols, the name of the symbols, and the definition of the symbols), and a 12” deep drawstring bag. There are three different ways to play it:
- Matching: Pick the level of cards to use and lay them all face up on a flat surface. Put the matching acrylic symbol on top of each card.
- Tactile: Put all of the musical symbols in the black drawstring bag. Have the student reach in and find a specific musical symbol (don’t peek!)
- VIVACE (“In a lively and brisk manner”): Lay out all the musical symbols and have all the players surround them. The teacher (or another student) is appointed to call out a musical symbol that everyone must grab. They have to quickly grab the correct musical symbol (because there is only one!) The player with the most musical symbols wins!
Playing games is the key to increasing knowledge of musical theory.
Musical theory is the key to understanding music.